


Stairs

by karakael



Category: Naruto
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-20
Updated: 2016-03-20
Packaged: 2018-05-28 00:34:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6306736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karakael/pseuds/karakael
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are no stairs in the sound.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Stairs

There are no stairs in the Sound

This may seem strange to one on the Outside. The Sound is full of parrots who talk big, fluffing themselves up ten times their size and crowing that they are more worthy than any who ‘failed’. Failure, of course, is an odd metric for those who steal their powers from others via science and drugs and experiments. Is 'failure’ when the spy breaks and the words that come bubbling out are so mad that no Leaf or Sand ninja would ever believe it? Are 'failures’ seen in scars and tattoos, because if so then there are words two rash young girls would like to have with you, and they so happen to be a Warden and a Gate. Or are 'failures’ thoughts of betrayal and hatred because son, that was what the Sound was built on.

No one is safe from failure. Lord Orochimaru second is a man who has been in deep cover for five years and who’s whole personality has been shattered and remade so many times there is only a fragment left of the lonely child on the battlefield. The most powerful members are children barely into high school, and yet somehow they fight hardest. Their heroes aren’t the ones who overcome physical obstacles: No, the madness takes even the strongest, those who should have known better than to ever come here, but now are forever trapped in a half-monster form, unable to control the poison sweeping through their veins. And those who don’t lose themselves are just more fodder for their Leader. To survive you balance the line between “too strong to survive” and “too useful to kill”.

And what do you do to defend from that? If everyone is at risk, if the next experiment could be your last…what do you do? There are no rules for these things in the 'normal’ world of villages and cities that would rather a child starve on the streets than find a space for him or her.

But arrogance is a cold comfort. Its a lie; a lie that you tell yourself over and over. You are too strong, to smart, to brave to fail. Those others…they were weak. In mind. In body. In spirit. You’re different from them. Lord Orochimaru picked You. He wouldn’t just throw you to the snakes like he did the others. (but he would. no one is safe. in the end everyone is either useful or dead.)

And so you tell the world, loudly, that you are better than it. You are Useful. The world is full of spies that were tortured, of girls who spend too much time on their hair, of women who are so strong that clearly they’ve never been tarnished by a man. The world is full of weak idiots who reach out in kindness, who can make beauty that does not burn, of those who stop to help when protecting yourself is the only true way to survive.

If you tell yourself this long enough, maybe you’ll believe it.

But until then, there are no stairs in the Sound. No matter how mad you are, you will always get a square meal and a bed to call your own. Every one of you is scared by your failures and for all the tough words, there are still helping hands.

Its no one’s fault they weren’t 'good enough’. There are healers and pills and all manner of experiments, things that keep the madness at bay for just a little longer. You can still be Useful, no matter how broken you are.

Its strange, then, that there are more healers than warriors at the Sound. But warriors run off to die, and healers remain to pick up the pieces. The Sound welcomes who ever is left. The girl with no eyes who can hear heart-beats. The boy with no arms who wished to become a spider. The child who would rather be locked away than harm a single soul.

And there is an odd kind of power to that. Perhaps its Orochimaru’s greatest strength: to see those left behind by the world and make something of them. He doesn’t care about physical imperfections or 'useless’ powers. They’re all fodder for his insatiable mind nonetheless.

And so there are gurneys in every corridor and wheel chairs. The walls have never been finished so the blind can pick their way through rooms by the tips of their fingers, except the ones which are padded just so so when you need to scream you can. Suicide is a word that used as a curse, not a punishment like in the other villages, and here you can talk about the flickering demons who plague your flute or you mind with no fear but scorn for admitting to 'failure’. Failure, in the end, being not a judgement but a warning of what submission to your demons will bring.

The madness takes everyone eventually.

But until then, there are no stairs in the Sound.


End file.
